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Anthropological skills in everyday use

Experiencing Anthropology outside of Academia and my story of how I became interested in the subject.

Anthropology and especially its main focus – the people and their culture always run through my life. As far as I remember, it all started pretty early for me. One summer at the lake Issyk Kol I became friends with a girl who did not speak Russian and I could not understand her Kyrgyz. In school I had friends from Afghanistan and America. I was interested in India since my early age and after studying journalism for two years I went to America for studies where I met more people and different cultures. Later I traveled to Mexico, India and Tajikistan. I had experience working with children, international students, assisting PhD research, counseling and my four and a half years of marriage with a man from India, and now we are raising our son, who reminds us of  'the culture matters'.

I would say that what especially remained with me about the lessons of anthropology are the two words UNDERSTAND and DIALOGUE. Like very often Mary Schweitzer would highlight it - TO STAND U-N-D-E-R is UNDERSTAND. It means to be able to stand under "the others" point of view, reason or thinking. It means to get deeper into the things that are easily seen and peep into what is not seen from the first sight. This takes patience, willingness and initiation. 

DIALOGUE is important because it helps in understanding – it is not only my opinion and impressions, it is also about others and what they think, know and experience. It is conversing, learning about each other, getting a new perspective and understanding.

At present I am not directly involved in academic anthropology but the skills that I received earlier help me to better UNDERSTAND the people that surround me, the culture and the world. I might not UNDERSTAND all of the life as such with all its complicated processes and undercurrents, but Anthropology skills – observation, asking questions and finding out the clues, help me in general and enrich my life.

I made a personal choice to get married into an Indian culture. I liked Indian movies and history and traditions from childhood.

But because I do- it does not mean that it is always easy for me to live in Indian culture. On every day level I always have to pose and think and ask. Sometimes there are moments in life when it gets frustrating. So I have to stop and think, to reflect and analyze and come up with new refreshed approach, with compassion, patience and hopefully, understanding.

There are several examples I could use where anthropology skills help me on a personal level:

1)  When I was expecting my baby in India I was going to an Indian doctor lady. I soon realized that culturally there are certain things that I “should not” ask my doctor that included both the pregnancy related issues and birth process, and also I could not ask about the gender of my baby.

2)   In India guests and relatives come to visit and see a new born baby as soon as the child is born, without waiting for a months or forty days. So when we had some visitors I had to understand them that it is not that they are not sensitive, they simply want to share my joy with me and see the baby.
3)   Humor has a very cultural color to it. What is funny in one culture is not necessarily funny in another culture.

When we (my husband and I) are among our Indian friends and they are laughing and I don't understand, I do not need to be offended or feel excluded, it takes patience and then I learn from my husband what it meant, so that next time I also can laugh or tell something funny so that others can understand. 
4)   People in India are very religious and spiritual. So the anthropological skills gained during my studies help me better understand the people and it enriches my life when I learn how to ask questions and hear the person who practices something different than me.

What I notice is that in the process of learning about and discovering “others” I also started to better understand self: who I am as a person, what I desire in this life and why and what choices I want to make to have a better experience in the places and with the people that surround me at a given moment. Now living these last past four and a half years in India I observe not only how different we are (eating habits, humor, worldview and practices) but also how much in common we have!


By Alyona Rasquinha CAA 05